48 students from 7 countries joined us for a four-day program held on campus at the University of Melbourne, in Melbourne Australia. My sincere thanks to the organizing team – Bec Payne and Mark Leak – and the teaching faculty – Nickola Overall, Lydia Woodyatt, Michael Thai, Amanda Rotella, Beatrice Alba, and Joel Anderson – who made the event such a success.
After a welcome breakfast and Day 1 teaching sessions, we were joined by guest speakers Dr Cassie Hayward and Dr James Plumridge for a group seminar on careers in academia.
We then officially opened the summer school with a welcome dinner in the St Hilda’s Dining Hall courtyard.
On Days 2 and 3 we continued our teaching streams, then were lucky enough to be joined by Drs Simine Vazire, Luke Smilie, Elise Kalokerinos, and Katie Greenaway for a panel discussion on peer review and editing. The students also attended a Box of Tricks session with the teaching faculty on best practices to survive and thrive in your PhD journey.
On the final day, Summer School students participated in a small grant pitch in small groups, each presenting a research idea to win a share of $1500 of research funding generously provided by SASP. Congratulations to our winners, Axel Chemke-Dreyfus (The University of Queensland), Christienne Javier (The University of Queensland), and Terise Broodryk (Victoria University of Wellington) for their proposal entitled “Progressive Privilege Paralysis”. Dana Trenaman, (Queensland University of Technology), Alisa Cabacungan (Central Mindanao University), and Yee Man Branda Yu (The University of Hong Kong) for their proposal entitled “Latent profiles of parent-child relationships and decision making for YouTube viewing” and Leah Smolarek (Flinders University), Emily Mullins (The University of Adelaide), Kati Harper (The University of Queensland), and Bronte Montgomery-Farrer (Deakin University) for their proposal entitled “The ‘Supreme Gentleman’: Does competition increase endorsement of problematic sexual behaviour?”
It was my pleasure to host the 2023 Summer School alongside the organizing team. A full folder of photos capturing the event is available HERE.
Best regards
Dr Khandis Blake and Bec Payn